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Flawed indictments kill 2014 jockey case and maybe others

A 12th District Court judge has thrown out the case against a jockey arrested at Ruidoso Downs nearly two years ago, in a decision that could be duplicated in other criminal cases filed in the fall of 2014 and perhaps many more since then.

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Flawed indictments kill 2014 jockey case and maybe others

Dave Tomlin, Ruidoso News
Published 4:56 p.m. MT Aug. 15, 2016

John Sugg, presumptive next 12th District Attorney, said he might consider filing new charges against a jockey whose illegal horse buzzer case was dropped due to a flawed indictment.(Photo: Alamogordo News)

Defense attorney Chris Nedbalek used a 2013 state Supreme Court case to persuade a district judge to drop a felony case against his client, a jockey charged with using an illegal buzzer on his horse at Ruidoso Downs.(Photo: Alamogordo News)

A 12th District Court judge has thrown out the case against a jockey arrested at Ruidoso Downs nearly two years ago, in a decision that could be duplicated in other criminal cases filed in the fall of 2014 and perhaps many more since then.

Jockey Raul Angel Valenzuela was pulled off his horse just before post time at the All American Futurity in September 2014 and charged with using a battery-powered buzzer under his saddle pad to stimulate his horse in a race the previous month.

The New Mexico Racing Commission suspended Valenzuela’s jockey license for five years. And a grand jury indicted him the following month.

But Judge Angie Schneider dismissed the indictment two weeks ago after Valenzuela’s attorney, Chris Nedbalek of Ruidoso, filed motions pointing out that the district attorney’s office had excused several prospective grand jurors from service without the approval of the supervising district judge. A companion charge of evidence tampering was also dismissed.

Nedbalek cited a New Mexico Supreme Court case from December 2013, De Leon v. Hartley, in which the high court ruled that grand jury selection was a responsibility of the district court which could not be delegated to the DA’s office.

“Without the district court actively involved in the entire grand jury process, public confidence in the integrity of the process is at risk,” the court stated in its ruling. “And if the integrity of the grand jury is called into question, there is little hope that the public at large, or the accused in particular, will view the grand jury as capable of returning well-founded indictments or serving as a realistic barrier to an overzealous prosecution.”

In the long run, the quashing of the indictment may not affect Valenzuela much. The DA’s office can restart his case from scratch. And racing commission director Izzy Trejo said the criminal case against the jockey has no effect on his license suspension, which remains in effect.

But any other criminal cases that began with indictments from the same grand jury that charged Valenzuela and are still in progress could be open to challenge by those defendants and their lawyers for the same reason Valenzuela got his case dropped.

“It could be a headache,” said attorney John P. Sugg, who is almost certain to be the next 12th District Attorney following his Republican primary victory over incumbent David Ceballes. No Democrat will appear on the November ballot. “It will probably be my headache,” he acknowledged.

How big a headache is not clear.

Sugg was an assistant district attorney until January of 2014, and he said the office at that time was aware of the state Supreme Court’s De Leon ruling one month earlier and had adjusted its procedures accordingly. He said when jurors asked to be excused, the request went to the grand jury foreperson, who took it up directly with the judge.

“We stepped out of it,” he said. “I don’t know if that has continued or not.”

Apparently it has not continued, judging from the Valenzuela outcome. Sugg said that the DA’s office will have to review Valenzuela’s case and any others that draw De Leon challenges to decide whether new charges should be filed. The do-overs will be a major burden if there are many of them.

Nedbalek said he would be surprised if prosecutors would consider it worth the trouble to bring new charges against a jockey in a two-year-old case. Sugg wasn’t so sure.

“We’re down so many lawyers in the DA’s office that it’s kind of overwhelming,” he agreed. “We’re budgeted for 16 attorneys, but we’re down to 10.” But he added that he might be inclined to take on the extra work in Valenzuela’s case.

“It was here in Ruidoso where a lot of people come to spend money at the racetrack and are relying on an even playing field,” he said. “We’ve got to take that seriously. To me it would certainly be a priority within the statute of limitations.”

The law under which Valenzuela was indicted is a 4th degree felony with a five-year statute of limitations.

Sugg said that before the De Leon ruling, it was typical for district attorneys’ offices to take a major hand in administering the grand jury selection process, but he didn’t know how many other districts might have failed to change their ways after the state Supreme Court said they had to.

Henry Valdez, director of the state Administrative Office of the District Attorneys, said he couldn’t say one way or the other.

“All I can tell you is that it’s never been brought up to me as a problem,” he said.